


Into The Wilds

by Foxtrot (SolidState)



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 16:51:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13415526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolidState/pseuds/Foxtrot
Summary: Short stories detailing events following the end of the Calamity.Link and Zelda learning how to live with what they've been through.





	1. Peace after Calamity

**Author's Note:**

> A series of short stories following the events after the Calamity has been defeated. Link and Zelda integrating back into the world and handling the difficulty of relearning themselves and each other. While the chapters are interconnected the stories may stand alone.

“It's two nights to Kakariko Village” Link said in his scratchy, airy voice as he knelt beside Zelda in the shady grass beneath a tall tree. A bit of parchment was laid out between them, on which Link had drawn a map of Hyrule as he traveled. The handwriting in many places was crude and child-like, evolving into a more steady hand as time passed. Several markers where scattered around; a prized ore vein here, an enemy to come back to at a later date over there and so on. 

Zelda had begun to worry her bottom lip in concentration, brow furrowed as she tried to follow the map but found that her memories couldn't place the location anymore. 

“Here” Link pointed at a spot on the map. “Is Kakariko” His hand moved across the parchment to a spot in Hyrule field. “We're about here” 

Link had set up a small lean-to off the beaten path with bedrolls laid beneath, a shallow pond lay nearby surrounded by a thicket of great green trees as wildflowers stretched around on all sides. His rucksack lay by the tree, which he'd occasionally dip his hand into and pull out a tasty bit of treat; a half flattened slice of cake, a crumbly bit of leftover pie, even a mason jar of berries that he'd drizzled in honey that made the fruit into a sweet sticky delight-that he'd then share with Zelda as they rested. 

Zelda was knelt beside Link, her knee's grass-stained and face smudged with grime. Link had given her his Hylian tunic-stripped of it's chain mail, leather armor and long undershirt- and it hung loosely around her in a way he found endlessly endearing. She wore the matching breeches, rolled up her calves several times, and was barefoot. Link had watched with an undignified snort as she had ripped the laced sandals from her feet and threw them hard into the brush. 

“Blast this entire dress!” she had shouted in frustration. 

She had damn near ripped the dress over her head then and there if not for Link's mildly panicked look and red ears. Zelda had lost a great deal of propriety being an ethereal being existing outside of time and space, it would seem. Link couldn't find it in himself to blame her. 

“Two days..” Zelda said a little miserably. The ache in her heart to see Impa was massive, after 100 years her patience had all but waned and two days felt like two hundred more years.

Link hesitated, reached into his bag, and pulled out a handkerchief followed by a waterskin. 

“Look at me” he had scooted over in front of her, legs crossed, and he began to wet the cloth.

“Hm?” she raised her eyes from the map and sat up straight for Link, tilting her head up a little to meet him. 

Carefully, slowly so that she might flinch away if she wanted, Link reached his free hand out to her and cupped her chin. Drawing her closer to him he began to scrub the grime from her face. 

“If you want to bathe in the lake, I can keep watch for you” his voice was so very soft, so light and feathery, she could have lost it in the wind. 

Face pink and clean Zelda stared at her hands in her lap.  
“A..wash would be nice” 

Link, ever the gentlemen, had set a blanket out for her at the edge of the pond and politely turned his back to look out over the fields. The thick trees curving around them assured a measure of privacy, and Zelda found herself surprisingly free from embarrassment as she undressed. The water came up to her knees in the deepest dip of the shallow pond, and felt blessedly cool in the warm afternoon. The handkerchief Link had handed over was dipped into the waters and she began to scrub 100 years of filth from her skin. 

Truth be told, Zelda spent less time truly bathing than she did to feel her own body. It had been lost to her in those 100 years and suddenly here it was. She was so very real and solid and HERE and she marveled at the feeling of her own skin as she ran her hands over her legs and gazed at the water dripping off her fingers. What would Link feel like, she wondered. Not at all ashamed of the thought, for it was not a new one and she had thought it many times in the past. Turning to face Link's back she stood nude in that shallow pond, watching the wind ruffle his hair about as he stretched in the sun. 

Would he join her, if she asked? Or would be abashed by such a question and abandon her there alone?  
No, he wouldn't abandon her. Of course he wouldn't. But neither, she thought, would he join her.

More's the pity. 

Where her feelings had gone from secret and shameful in some distant past, they had become mere facts of her life. Neither good nor bad, merely there and she had come to embrace them all.  
“Two days then” She sat down beside him in the grass, both looking at each other as something unknowable passed between them in this quiet moment out in the wilds.


	2. A New Beginning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the Calamity clears Impa wonders over the fate of Zelda and Link

The sky over Hyrule had glowed with a massive golden light, flickering down like fireflies and spreading into the soil. The air had lightened and seemed to breathe out a great sigh, here in this moment the Calamity met its demise. All eyes where turned skyward to watch in awe as malice was pulled from the depths of the land and sent shattering into oblivion.

A great thundering BOOM was felt, and heard in the most deep recesses of their minds, as the sky parted then cleared.

The entire land was bathed in an otherworldly aura, like lightning before it strikes, raising the hair on their arms and digging deep in their veins. An end had occurred, a beginning had risen. Clawing its way from the grime to pull itself towards the sky to shout “I am here”. No one dared move for a great stretch of time, as that lightning crawled its way up their backs and sent their hair on end. Transfixed with their eyes on the sky above. 

Impa was there, standing among her people in Kakariko Village as they all gazed at the golden light. Many questions passed through Impa in this moment, urgent jumbling thoughts that ducked to and fro in the waves of her mind.

_'Is Zelda alive._

_Is she whole and hale._

_Is she but a withered old woman like me._

_Or is she truly lost to us as the Champions had been._

_Will Link have survived. Will they come. Will I see her again or shall I die without her in this world.'_

Terribly aching questions these where. Questions Impa could not answer, would have to wait two agonizingly long days to know. But Impa was patient in ways Zelda was not and knew in the depths of her heart she must be strong and she must wait. She could not know it would be much sooner than it felt until Zelda would fling herself-sobbing and laughing-into Impa's arms and they would be together again. _At last_.

That the Goddess would bless them with more life to live in each others company.


	3. Sunrise and Sunset

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Impa and Zelda reunite after the Calamity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters in one day! Both where quite short and closely connected but other chapters may be less chronological and more stand alone :)

It was a moment Impa would remember until the day she died, though that would not be for many long years still. 

She could remember the warm sunny afternoon breeze, the smell of incense curling smoke trails through the hall, the chirping of birds on the rooftop and the sound of quick feet dashing up the stairs outside. All clear and crisp in her mind until the very last moment of her life. 

Zelda had burst in like a great gale, flinging the doors open and coming to a sudden stop with the bright sun at her back, casting a hazy glow around her. There was a beat as the two gawked at one another, then Zelda was across the room and clutching Impa fast as lightning. Fingers twisted in each-others shirt as deep wracking sobs quivered down Zelda's body and shook Impa to the core. Her own tears where quiet and rolled tracks down her cheeks as Impa gasped in shock and great relief that cleared her soul. 

Nothing was said for a long time. Two friends, dear as mother and daughter, holding each-other as if their very souls had joined in that moment. For in many ways, they had. 

When their tears had slowed and the hiccuping sobs subsided they both held each-others hands and drew back, laughing and grinning and then crying. Happy warm tears now. Joyful and full, making their cheeks rosy. 

“Oh child how this old woman has missed you” 

“But Impa” Zelda spoke with an impish grin lighting up her pretty face “I am 118 years old! I am but an old woman as well” and they laughed once more, hands clasped together between them. 

Impa would die with Zelda (and Link,and Purah, and Paya) by her bedside, all those many years later. Her mind would be whole and clear and her heart full of so much aching love it was full to bursting. She would hold Paya's trembling hand close to her heart and cup Zelda's fair cheek and say “How lucky I am to have lived what I have lived, and known what I have known, and to be so loved”. But that was then and the two would remain bonded through ages unknown until their next life would bring them together once more. Old souls reuniting in some distant unknowable future, as sure as the sunrise and the sunset.


End file.
